Do you have to book trains in advance in Uzbekistan?

Hi there,

We’re planning a 15-day trip to Uzbekistan in March—classic independent itinerary: Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara, Khiva. We’d like to take the train between each city, but I don’t want to lock down the whole trip before we leave.

So, my question is: is it absolutely necessary to book train tickets before departure, whether for the high-speed trains or the regional ones? Is booking really essential for the regional trains?

Thanks a bunch!

Philippe

Hi, It's not peak season, but you can still book your train and cancel—it costs less than 1 euro in fees if you do it 24 hours in advance. We canceled and rebooked other tickets really easily using the app or at the station. We loved the sleeper trains!

thanks so much for this really useful info! it’s a great idea, since we want to keep some flexibility in the end, we might give February a try!

thanks again

Hi there, no, not necessarily.

On our side, we booked the overnight train with sleeping berths from France, because we’d been told the Bukhara-Khiva leg was really booked up (in November), and there were five of us. But it’s doable online from France, no need for an agency. Even kind of funny because the automatic translations give you a "diploma" when you manage to book! From what I remember, we did it as soon as the seats opened online, about 3 weeks before the trip.

It’s absolutely amazing, this train journey! So much local flavor. Bring earplugs!!

Thanks so much for your reply, we’ll do that too... What class did you take?

We’re a couple—I think there are also train cars with berths for two people.

Philippe